What's In A Name
by KissofJudas
Summary: Set in the future. Tiny little drabble - written so that I had a story to place the last line in. Tseng and Genesis have a tiny friend living with them.


The dark-haired man frowned at the small animal writing around on the floor, eagerly attacking the brand new bed it had been given. "Why is it doing that?"

"Doing what?"

"Attempting to destroy its bed."

The red-head staying with him looked over his shoulder, shaking his head. "That's what they do, Tseng. It's a puppy. I don't know why you're surprised."

Tseng frowned deeper as the puppy seemed to give up, laying in the bed and closing its eyes. "I've never understood animals."

His roommate – because that's what the man was, for lack of a better word – settled down in a chair, book in hand. "What's there to understand? It's a baby dog. It eats, shits, sleeps, and bothers you. Like most young things."

It was difficult, after all these years alone, to deal with living with someone again. In the time after the rise of the remnants, people had begun to see other long-dead faces suddenly appearing in the world – often with little to no memories of who they might have been in the past. It was fairly sure that they were in fact the dead risen again, because often memories could be awakened...but it was hard to say for certain. Many people didn't want to know.

The man that Tseng was housing was one of the few that had risen that made the world's populace nervous. As of yet, no one had seen a tall, silver-haired man wandering around (though that, of course, was the underlying fear) but one of the SOLDIER he had once called friend had emerged.

Tseng had offered to house him. He'd already lived with one annoying, over-active red-head. Reno would be more than practice enough for Genesis Rhapsodos. Or so he thought.

"I suppose." Tseng leaned back, taking his eyes off the puppy briefly. Genesis had insisted that if he was going to be living in this apartment, essentially trapped indoors with no way to travel on his own, he wanted a companion. Tseng was vehemently against it – given his allergies – but Genesis hadn't taken no for an answer. So the rules were no dogs in Tseng's office or his bedroom, and Genesis had to keep the dog cleaned up after itself. If Tseng came out and found that the dog had used Tseng's Wutain carpet as a bathroom, hell was going to be dished up. And he wouldn't serve it like revenge.

"Are you cooking again?"

"I'd rather thought I could."

"Are you cooking Wutain again?"

Tseng glared. "I don't cook it that often."

"We've had it every night this week."

"Genesis, it's Tuesday. We ate at Rude's apartment on Sunday and he made tacos. Yesterday you brought home a bag of rice and told me to work my dark magic on it. I made stirfry. I don't think your argument holds much water."

"You always cook Wutain." The former SOLDIER was dismissive.

"You sound like Reno."

Despite the allergies, Tseng didn't mind having the dog around. He didn't mind have Genesis in the apartment either, to be fair. He'd always been a solitary creature, even when he was young, but the fact of the matter was that while he enjoyed being by himself, he hated to be alone. He'd never really been alone. He's had his father's team, until they were killed...and then he'd had teams of his own. It hadn't been until after each of the Turks went off into either the WRO or somewhere else...that he'd really ended up on his own.

He missed Reno. Despite all the problems, and all the fights, and all the differences between them... The former Turk leader tried to shrug off the sharp twinge of pain. He couldn't think about that – not about him. Not right now.

"Well, are you cooking or not?"

"I can. And I'll make something that _isn't_ Wutain. Just to make you happy." Tseng stood – and nearly stepped on the puppy, who was running laps at full tilt around Tseng's coffee table.

"Careful, he's a maniac."

"Aren't you the one that picked him out?"

"Well sure – but even for a puppy, he's pretty ridiculous."

Tseng smirked. "Well you named him Zack. What can you really expect?"


End file.
